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Tag Archives: User Experience

I spend a lot of my working life developing strategies for brands that need to move from broadcast, through audience engagement, to immersive connectivity, thinking three years into the future as a minimum, then I leave work and step into a broadcast heavy advertising bombardment and it saddens me.

That’s not to take anything away from the clever ads out there, but just imagine a future where advertising is intelligently informed, rewarding at just the right moment rather than randomly broadcast in a vain attempt to get your attention.

Imagine that subtle product placement is integrated into how you live your life; your fridge is able to provide branded recipes based on it’s contents, your car can recommend a restaurant based on the time of day and your preferred driving routes, that restaurant then has your cocktail waiting on arrival with your preferred gin of choice.

It might sound mildly creepy to some but to me this everyday surprise and delight is an ease of living I am waiting to embrace.

I want brands to enable me to accomplish more, more seamlessly. We’re a few steps away from living in a truly connected world so every exchange between me and any brand should be streamlined at the very least.

All we’re missing is the common language that connects all our smart devices but this will arrive soon and brands that adopt this thinking now, will be the ones that write the first chapter.

Brands need to understand that they should be replacing my behaviours, not reinventing them; my ask is simple really, get to know me, then make my life better.

I spent 94 minutes on the phone to British Gas on Saturday morning, trying to set up paying for my bills for the 3rd time since I’ve moved into my new home, and couldn’t because of system issues their end. The guy at the end of the phone could not have been less bothered, and all I wanted to do was be able to go online and set up everything myself, but I couldn’t.

Going online is always my first port of call, anything that spares me giving my D.O.B umpteen times and spelling my postcode out more so. For the duration of the call, I sat in a state of denial, hitting the refresh button at 10 second intervals hoping some magical 5xx error state would relieve me of my frustration, trust me, this user experience gives 418 I’m a teapot a run for it’s money!!

This isn’t the only awful experience out there though, I mean there are so many, I’m sure as you’re reading this, you’re nodding your head and recalling a twitchy ‘I AM CALM’ online moment… So it got me thinking (not for the first time) what would make me happy, make you happy, and therefore all users of the World Wide Web… happy.

I’m the kind of person who will choose a restaurant with good food and excellent, personal service, over an excellent culinary experience but average service, every time. Over the last year or so I’ve started doing the same with shopping, I avoid shops with bad layouts and moody checkout chicks, I will pick theatres with nice door-staff and bar-staff and I will stay in hotels that have good concierge.

That’s what I believe we’re missing online; an online concierge service as standard, what could that protocol look like? As someone who obsesses with the detail when designing experiences, how could we democratise the luxury unrivalled personal service and exclusive privileges to save time and effort for everyone…